Why J. Lo and Naomi Campbell Are Tweeting Selfies in Bed

Keen observers of social media may have lately noticed faces ranging from Jennifer Lopez, Stephen Fry, and Tom Hiddleston to Hugh Grant and Naomi Campbell tweeting pictures of themselves first thing in the morning, along with the hashtag #WakeUpCall. The burgeoning meme is not some random bit of social self-flagellation, but rather part of Jemima Khan’s #WakeUpCall campaign. Khan, a U.K. Unicef Ambassador and European editor-at-large of this publication, conceived of the hashtag to help wake people up to the refugee situation in Syria. Specifically, the campaign aims to raise funds for Syrian refugees, including the 80,000 Syrian refugees in the Zaatari camp in Jordan. Khan hopes to outdo the £8 million the #NoMakeUpSelfie brought in for cancer research and the $100 million the Ice Bucket Challenge raised for A.L.S. VF Daily caught up with her recently to find out how the project plans to do that.

VF Daily:What was it about the situation in Syria that compelled you to take action?

Jemima Khan: There was a lot of focus on the military campaign and our military intervention, but the humanitarian tragedy had fallen out of the news.

#WakeUpCall is a bit like a meeting of the #IceBucketChallenge and the #nomakeupselfie—how did you come up with the idea?

I was trying to incorporate the best bits of both. I thought what worked with the Ice Bucket Challenge was that it was a video, but actually I think the appealing factor was that it was kind of amusing.

I read an article where you say that it is better when people do the #WakeUpCall picture against their will. What did you mean by that?

When I was first thinking about how we could raise money I thought that it would be funny if you had a forfeit. You take a picture of your husband looking terrible first thing and then if he doesn’t pay the forfeit, it goes on social media. It was just another way to raise money. I posted a video of my dog waking me up. Like, how do you wake up in the morning? My sons let my dog into the room. But with this, the thing that caught on was the selfies.

Who has not participated that you want to?

I tried to get the One Direction crew to donate because they have so many Twitter followers. It’s a joke! Harry Styles tweets “Good Morning” and it gets retweeted about 100,000 times, it’s ridiculous!

I’ve read that some people gave you some glib responses when you asked them to get involved?

It was quite funny because someone had e-mailed me to say, “Oh my God, well done, it’s been a great success, you’ve even had the obligatory snarky Guardian article.” In a way, it’s a measure of something taking hold of the public imagination and some measure of success. At the time it was really annoying because you worry that it is going to shame people into not participating. I do see why these campaigns can be a little annoying for people, but I think it’s important to look at the intention behind things.

How do you keep momentum for a campaign like this?

It’s really difficult. I have to keep thinking of different ways to raise money. We’ve gone the traditional route, which was a big charity fund-raising dinner. We raised almost £1 million. And then, we’ve got an art auction that’s happening at Phillips. Alison Jackson is going to do a spoof #WakeUpCall for the highest bidder. You can put yourself in bed with your favorite celebrity.

Working on #WakeUpCall, do you feel confident that the money you are collecting is going directly to the cause?

All big charities have overheads; it is just something you have to accept in order to get to the far-flung places. UNICEF is one of the very few that actually agrees to operate in this war-ravaged country, and they have a presence inside. And in order to get to those places, there are always going to be financial overheads. I tend to work with both big charities and very small ones, because I can really see the advantages and disadvantages of both.

What has been the response? Is it difficult to get the average person to engage in the cause?

I think it’s hard to make people try to identify full stop with causes that are far away. And I think the refugees’ situation is always so challenging because these are people who are unwanted wherever they are. They don’t have anything. Most of the people we spoke to had left their homes with absolutely nothing. They leave in a rush in the middle of the night with their children. I asked, “Did you bring your door key even?” And I don’t think anybody said yes. These people have absolutely nothing. They are the most deprived people on earth.

Visit unicef.org.uk/Syria to make a donation to help protect Syria's children from danger. Until January 31, 2015, the U.K. Government will match your donation pound for pound.

Bridget ArsenaultBridget Arsenault is the London correspondent at vanityfair.com and worked in Vanity Fair’s London office from 2009 to 2016, before which she completed her Master’s at Oxford University.